Here's what ObamaCare will really cost us...

The costs of ObamaCare are no real secret.Practically every time you check the news, there's a new report on how much ObamaCare will cost you.

The most recent GAO report estimates the full cost of ObamaCare will add $6.2 trillion to the national debt. Just last week, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius was forced to acknowledge that ObamaCare will, in fact, increase insurance premiums. (Nice of her to notice, since it's already happening: The average family premium is up $2,000 since 2010.)

But even as much as we can all comprehend dollars and cents, these costs of ObamaCare have been abstract and somewhat nebulous.

Rosemarie Battaglia, a senior citizen from Texas, is on Medicare Advantage. Last month, the Medicare agency issued regulations that will reduce her health benefits, starting April 1, by thousands of dollars every year. Because coverage costs are expected to increase on average by $2,235 a year, Mrs. Battaglia has postponed her retirement indefinitely.

Why? To help pay for ObamaCare.

Of course, she' s not alone:

Hugh Joyce, owner of the 150-employee James River Air Conditioning in Richmond, Virginia, recently told the Washington Post that his insurer has warned him to expect an 18 percent spike in his company’s health insurance premiums next year. Why? To help pay for ObamaCare.

“If our cost trajectory continues,” Joyce told the Post, “in five to seven years the premiums will eat up all my net profit. … This [law] may be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.”

Rosemarie and Hugh are just the tip of the iceberg. As Clancy goes on to point out, "millions of workers at places like Wendy’s and Olive Garden are now being preemptively reclassified as part-time, and an estimated 7 million to 20 million employees face the loss of workplace health benefits altogether."

The great economist Milton Friedman identified one of the great errors of politics was to judge government policies not by the outcomes they produce, but instead by the intentions of the politicians who create them.

Whatever the intentions of the people who brought us ObamaCare, the outcomes for people like Rosemarie, Hugh, and millions more are as real as they are harmful.

Independent Women’s Voice is an advocacy 501(c)(4) that fights for women and families by effectively expanding support among women, independents, and millennials for policy solutions that aren’t just well intended, but actually enhance people’s freedom, choices, and opportunities.